a prayer to the flat tire gods... forgive me my past neglect (Clermont sprint ITU)

So i must admit, I have mocked the gods of triathlon. In particular the ones with control over flat tires. Beginner's luck? I can't be sure but I can be sure of a few things. Never assume a rider will keep a clean line. This is especially true around 180degree turns. I am a reasonably aggressive rider and know how to watch out for things in cycling. This comes as a result from lots of practice in Crit races. I cannot stress the benefits of learning how to ride in the dangerous packs. It's key to be mindful of your surrounding and be loud and communicate. you can never assume someone will hold their line. As i did today. Heading into the first turn around at 2.5km I was one of the top 5 or so riders. I had made a decision to stay near the front as it's always safer. Even so I went into the counter clockwise turn around with a Mexican on my right and an American on my inside left. My front wheel was tagged as the rider to my inside swung wide toward the end of the turn. According to weirdtristats.com (and a particular peer edited article on a scientific study*1) I managed to succeed in meeting the 1/13,869 (0.0000721%) chance of a competitors derailler catching at breaking off the valve stem of the tire. I've never heard of this happening... but it did. This immediately took all the air out of my front tire.  In addition to being taken down. I hopped back up rather quickly as the secretory Chromaffin cells within my adrenal medulla pumped a solution consisting of 80% epinephrine, 20% norepinephrine, and a little bit of Dopamine for fun, through my body. I had hoped that the sound of a flat was not me and was ready and able to jump back in with the pack, as they had slowed down significantly for the turn and I was in the front half. I was stopped short. At this time my i left loose a few profane statements and cleared the course.  Came out out with only a few scraps to my ankle, knee and hip. Bit of aesthetic damage to the my amazing Bont shoes and white speed machine but nothing big.  Will race another day. The event brings with it quite a bit of frustration as my race was going very well and I felt really on top of my game. I came out of the water (wading pool?) with a very significant lead after what seemed to me to be an easy run/swim.   My heart rate felt like it was under 120 for the entire swim/run. I'm sure it was higher but heading into it I  felt calm and relaxed. I admit I was skeptical and unconfident in my ability to come out with a lead. Just because of the fact that the first and last 200m of the swim was in water 6 - 24inches deep. Wish my boy Sharpie was up there with me and was able to race. His long legs would been perfect for this pseudo-duathlon. We could crushed together. I think my standing in the swim relied on my staying calm and not sprinting at full tilt the first 100m of the swim. I stayed behind and then made a surge once people began to dolphin dive, got clear water just before the first bouy at 400m and I was gone. You go a lot faster without someone leeching off your hip. This was a confidence booster and I was able to cruise into T1 keeping it relaxed, just like the start. Leave more training time to Bike-Run focus? Just kidding, I know as soon as I race with a stronger swim weighted field I'll be eating those words. Good experience, bad turn of events (no pun-intended ;) ). Excited for the next opportunity. Gonna go for a run now and enjoy the sun before I go home to Victoria. Watch for some of the NTC squad on Hockey night in Canada today, Habs VS. Tampa.  The boys are making use of the cheap ticket prices down here for some good hockey. Wish I could be there but have some studying to do if I wanna be out of school in the next 100 years.
Until next time,
Cole

 here's a video of the swim start and exit... big field.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PbWh870QoWA

I'd like to throw out a huge thank you to my sponsors and supporters, without help I wouldn't be where I am now. The all white custom Cyfac was a power horse as always, unreal power transfer, made life easy peasy lemon squeezy :) Assistance from ThinkMindShift helps me train hard and not have to sweat the details. Support from Trigeeks, Blueseventy, Leonard Hill, Anthony King and lets not forget my parents lets me get that much further ahead. Thanks!



*1-not an actual source :p I try and be funny sometimes

side note. cool info on nutrition shared by alex coates  c.heck it out

Some thoughts on food (or food for thought)

Was doing some reading and came across this article. Food is usually on my mind so I found this very interesting. Take is with a grain of salt. Hope you find it to be a good read despite it's length.
http://www.second-opinions.co.uk/taubes.html

Team TT and some action!

Training is going great and the spirits here are high despite some fatigue all around I'm sure. We are having to say goodbye to a few of the guys and gals who have to leave training paradise here in Clermont. They will be sorely missed as there contributions were all positive. 

The last bit of training has been great with some good work in the pool, in the saddle and in the sneakers. The Team TT was an awesome workout for everyone from what I could tell. It gave everyone an exciting little race to give our adrenaline addictions a fix. Teams were made the day before based on ranking the times etc. We were also given the opportunity to take off 5, 15 or 30 seconds (divided by the number of members on the TT team) from our TT time, based off how fast we chose to swim the two sets of 12x100's. This added a little fun into the mix and made the swim a bit faster too (awesome idea CT!)  

The teams were given a time, which was derived from the average of the team members previous TT times. The goal was to smash this time by as much as you could now that you were working with the others around your speed. In order of time improvement (total time improvement divided by # of riders in the team)... including swim time bonus

                                                       

1.  Team International/Gryffindor (Christin, Wilson, Stewart) 0:58" 

2.  Team BC/Ravenclaw (Sharpe, Powell, Foreman, Thomas) 0:45"

3.  Team ON1/Slytherin (Jamnicky, Quick, Lokody) 0:43"

4.  Team ON2/Hufflepuff (Donald, Hinton, Woodfine, Vierula, Brown, Bredschnieder) 0:37"

avg speeds

1. 42.4 km/hr

2.  39.2 km/hr

3.  34.8 km/hr

4.  40.2 km/hr 

Pictures and data courtesy of coach Craig Taylor, huge props! 

Times and data -

Pics from the swim - 

Pic from the ride -

Team international/Gryffindor ready to crush! (all business ;) ) -

sunshine

It's been a few good days of training, got the team time trail tomorrow. Jason, Marc and I are looking to crush. Should be fun!


heres pic from the run at "the grove" today!

Clermont - Bike TT result

The course was a sunny, moderately windy, and hilly 17.8km loop. Thanks to the great coaching staff we have here with us, everyone was well looked after and it was a safe and fun practice. Courtesy of the great coach Craig Taylor of the RTC Guelph (and Jason Wilson's powertap) here are the times*

*everyone has put in a solid block of training so far and effort level was up to the athlete, just some cool data to look at!


- an interesting side note and comment relating to Simons Whitfield's post about a time standard for cycling not yet being instigated for World Cup entry. If you assume the we can keep up the pace for another 2.2km,  multiply the times by 12.36% (2.2km/17.8km-at pace) on this training effort. How many of our young canucks would make a WC standard? Our top time was by Marc-Antoine Christin with a TT time converting to 30mins 46secs for 20km TT. Looks like some strong fitness from everyone. Just a cool thought.
peace.

Day 2,3 and 4

It's safe to say that the training camp is well underway, it felt like I logged a 70.3/half-iron man in with the amount of training on day 2. Managed to get a good progressive workload in, along with a solid dose of sun and fun. This did however, come with a price and the fatigue onset is very noticeable. I've settled into the Value Place extended stay hotel with the rest of the BC boys and got the fridge stocked with food. Home base is well and good. It's only a 12 minute bike ride to the NTC (National Training Centre) and the roads are pretty smooth sailing. The weather couldn't be better, with blue skies and not too too hot, the training conditions are really comfortable. Today the whole gang of Canucks swarmed to the pool for a solid and steady short course yards swim during the cooler misty morning. The BC crew just got back from our late morning sunny run with enough time to relax and regenerate for the much anticipated 18km bike TimeTrial. Update on the outcome soon to come!
C.

Day 1 and arrival

Got in at 7.30pm Florida time on friday and met up with the crew for the ride into Clermont.  The Ontario was kind enough to  let me crash on the big comfy couch until the arrival of my fellow Victorians. Had a solid group ride with the crew and followed by a good solid run around the swamp. The weather's perfect and I 'm looking forward to a good hard day of work tomorrow with swim bike and run on the menu.

Clermont, Florida

On the morning of the 18th I'll be flying out to Clermont, Florida to meet up with the Ontario squad for a solid block of training in the sun. On the 5th of March is the Clermont ITU sprint triathlon Pan Am cup. This should be a good race after a solid block of training and I'm sure all the Canadian guys are stoked to crush it. While i'm down in Clermont I'll be posting updates on training and maybe some cool photo's if your lucky.
C.